The kerfuffle over when President Obama will deliver his address to a joint session of Congress was not only historic, it may have damaged Obama’s effort to portray himself as above the Washington partisanship that has angered and exasperated the public.
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Democratic strategists across Washington on Thursday were both mystified and critical of Obama’s attempt to schedule the address, which will focus on his jobs creation plan, on Sept. 7, the same night as a much-anticipated Republican presidential debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California.
A few Democrats even went on the record to blast the move, including James Carville, a former top aide to President Clinton, who on ABC’s “Good Morning America” called Obama’s effort to address Congress during the GOP debate “out of bounds.” Carville also said Obama appeared to have “caved” in to Republicans by ultimately agreeing to move the address to the following night, Sept. 8, which also happens to be the opening night of the National Football League’s regular season.
Other strategists, speaking only on the condition of anonymity, said Obama looked bad and had no one to blame but himself.
“Neither side looked good,” one Democratic strategist told The Washington Examiner.
White House officials called the Sept. 7 scheduling conflict coincidental, but Republicans weren’t buying it. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, told Obama in a letter that Sept. 7 presented logistical problems. Congress is just returning that day from its summer recess and has votes scheduled that evening. Also, security wouldn’t have enough time to scour the House chamber, he said.
“It is my recommendation that your address be held on the following evening, when we can ensure there will be no parliamentary or logistical impediments that might detract from your remarks,” Boehner wrote.
Some say Boehner’s response is the first ever rejection of a presidential request to address Congress, but Republicans argue that it was Obama who failed to follow decades of protocol.
“There is a procedure here, and they short-circuited the procedure,” said John Feehery, a Republican political consultant and former top aide to former House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill.
Feehery said Obama was supposed to first work out an acceptable date with Boehner’s staff and then await an official invitation from the speaker to address Congress.
“It’s the speaker’s House,” Feehery said. “It’s almost like inviting yourself over to watch a football game in the speaker’s house and finding the speaker’s not home.”
Another former top aide to Hastert, Republican strategist Ron Bonjean, said Obama’s administration looked disorganized and desperate trying to schedule the speech so it interrupted the GOP debate.
“The White House had several weeks to plan out the president’s speech and really fumbled the ball here,” Bonjean said.
Former Rep. Martin Frost, D-Texas, faulted both sides in the spat, but said the infighting would not matter to the public.
“The concern is about what the president is going to say,” Frost said, “not when he’s going to say it.”
